Lance Stroll breaks a painful F1 record in Jeddah and fires back, blaming the car and calling out McLaren’s advantage.
Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll made headlines in Jeddah, but not for the reasons he’d have liked.
The Canadian driver set an unfortunate Formula 1 record during qualifying for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix: the most Q1 exits since the current knockout format was introduced in 2006. With 75 early eliminations to his name, he’s now surpassed Haas’ Kevin Magnussen in that statistic.
Stroll, who only managed 16th on the grid, didn’t seem too bothered. In fact, he had a few choice words for the McLaren camp.
“Yeah, I heard that stat over the loudspeaker at the track, pretty cool,” Stroll said with a smirk, before taking a dig at Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.
“If the McLaren guys spent ten years driving a Sauber, they’d have the most Q1 exits too. It’s all about the car.”
Stroll went on to defend his performance, arguing that fast cars make everything easier — from tire strategy to reaching Q3 — while slower cars force drivers to push flat-out in Q1 just to survive.
“You can have all the fresh tire sets in the world, but if you don’t have the pace, it doesn’t matter,” he said. “That’s just how it goes.”
When reminded that teammate Fernando Alonso did make it out of Q1, Stroll’s tone sharpened.
“We’ve been struggling all weekend — 18th, 19th in practice. So yeah, 16th in quali is actually a step up,” he snapped. “Back in 2024, I did a 1:28.2 and made it to Q2. Today, I did a 1:28.6 and got knocked out. That tells you everything. The car hasn’t improved. Make of that what you will.”
Alonso didn’t hold back either, echoing Stroll’s frustration.
“To be honest, we might be the slowest team on the grid right now,” the two-time world champion admitted. “We’re throwing three sets of tires at Q1 just to scrape into Q2 — and if we do make it, we’ve got nothing left.”
“The factory needs to find solutions, because the team at the track has run out of ideas.”
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Stroll Hits Out at McLaren After Q1 Record Shame Stroll Hits Out at McLaren After Q1 Record Shame
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